Pradhan denies receiving any payments from Vyapam scam accused

Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan today denied receiving any payments from an accused of Vyapam admission and recruitment scam, saying he never took any ticket from any individual and his travel was always paid by his party.

Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan today denied receiving any payments from an accused of Vyapam admission and recruitment scam, saying he never took any ticket from any individual and his travel was always paid by his party.

“I vehemently deny taking any favours or tickets from any individual. As a party activist, the party (BJP) usually booked my tickets,” he told PTI here.

Dismissing allegations levelled by Congress leaders Jairam Ramesh and Randeep Surjewala that they had documents to show accused Sudhir Sharma extending favours to BJP and RSS leaders, he said “I want to ask them (Congress leaders) who bears cost of their press conferences? Naturally, the Congress party. And so was it in my case. As party activist, all my tickets were done by my party office.”

Pradhan said he did know Sharma but had never asked him for tickets to travel to Bhopal in May 2010 for a party activity.

“I never got tickets from anybody,” he said. “All tickets for my Party work were booked by the Party office. I got no tickets from any individual,” Pradhan said.